Tags
A Devine Tragedy, Abnegation, acrobats, Anxiety, Arrogance, automatons, beings, bowels, brothers, Brothers of Personnel, Capitulation, Captain, chariots, circus, circus acts, Cloistered, Corona, corsairs, Craps, creative man, Creativity, dark of night, Dice, doom, dungeons, Education, equines, Ever Onward, Failure, Frederich Nietzsche, Gluttony, Human bodies, labor, loathing, lust, Machinations, Mail Call, Mankind, measuring devices, Mess hall, Microcomputers, misery, money changers, Money Lenders, Mortared Walls, Nepotism, Originality, Overman, Panoptics, Passion, Perseverance, Personnel, Petier Bruegel the Elder, Pharisees, Phenomena, Poker, Pride, Priest of Personnel, repeated spasms, revelry, searching, Secret Society, seeking, Self Respect, Shylocks, sisters, sloth, smoke, Snake Eyes, spouses, sweat, tax collectors, tears, the body, The Horses, the mind, the seducer, The Seven Somambulists, The State, Time Clocks, Toil, tools, triumph, trumpets, truth, underman, vengeance, vipers, walking wounded, wisdom, Wrath, Zombie
Orpheus Taming the Animals
Finally one of the clown-owls walked behind the curtain and returned with a large wire-mesh cage full of frogs. The cage was attached to a table with three legs.
He shoved aside a few of the sheep and the dead acrobat so that he could place the cage in the center of the circus ring. As he stood back the frogs awoke from their lethargic stupor. One by one they would look around to see who was watching. As each individual frog was sure that he had an audience (even one clown-owl would suffice as an audience) he would jump into the air. Typically the frog would only jump to a moderate height. He would look around to see if his audience pitied him for this very poor showing.
A lamented croak would escape his bulging throat.
The audience did not react.
One by one the cage full of frogs repeated this mournful act of pitiful jumps. And the audience continued its bored look because, of course, they could not determine what these poor beings were attempting to do.
The croaking became sorrowful and everyone wished that it would stop. It did not.
It almost sounded like a human phrase; “poor me, poor me, poor me.” One of the clowns walked around the circus ring with a large cardboard image of a crying moon. It added a nice touch of sadness.
FRED REMAINED SILENT
Tomorrow: “The Circus Acts Continued, Book 49, Verse 5, Dead Fish and Sacrificial Worms”
waldotomosky 
This is really sad! Poor frogs!
Yes. It is sad in two ways. Sad that they could not jump and sad that they were so pitiful that they did not even wish to try. Thank you so much for reading and commenting on my posts.
I TRY to read your posts but with a 3 year old I miss some! Do you think apathy is linked to depression? Or ignorance?
I really do not know. If I were to take a guess I think it is something that is learned from childhood. For example; if a child learns to get his or her way by screaming for anything even at the age of 4 then that person has learned to be demanding and will probably be demanding in later life. It is not a matter of ignorance because the child has learned that attribut. And it is definately not depression because the child is always rewarded for the bad behavior. If apathy is rewarded over and over by the parents and then the teacher and then the boss, then apathy is learned. But remember, I really do not know. It is only the observations of a 74 year old man.
I think it’s a wonderful observation!!! I don’t know the answer really. I think it’s depression. I think some times people think the world is so big and ugly that there is NOTHING they can do so they shut off. Anyway just wondering because of the frogs! Thanks!
With a three year old it is a wonder you have any time for yourself!!!!!!!!!! Thank you for taking the time to read those posts that you have. Wally
Of Course your welcome!
Pitiful frogs. I guess it is appropriate that they “croak.” 🙂
I wish I would have thought of that! Great comment. Thank you for visiting and reading these rather strange posts. I have a question for you. Do you think that the readers were able to interpret these posts or did I make them too abstract?
Thanks so much!
Probably. 🙂 What was your underlying meaning?
The whole series is the story of a young man who started his work life, entered the army, came home to work in a factory and then watch the entire corporation be brought to its knees by apathy, arrogance, inbreeding of thought, and believing the status quo was a satisfactory way of doing business; therefore the tragic end which the posts are now defining.
I love the metaphor of the frogs! It sounds like a wonderful story although rather sad!